black tape for a blue girl is the original
Projekt band. Sam Rosenthal writes pretty much all of the material
which is a lot of times ambient keyboard tones with lots of reverb &
then sometimes people sing & lately there's cello & now flute too.
he also runs Projekt in case you didn't know that. here's some other
data to help this make sense: Lycia & lovesliescrushing are bands on
Projekt & there is a novel/diary/book that Sam wrote called the first
pain to linger that comes with a cd.

QRD – have you ever not signed anyone you
liked because you didn't see much sales potential in Projekt's market for
them?

Sam – no. but occasionally I have
signed people who I later didn't like so much because I thought there was
sales potential. but I did like them at the time I signed them.

QRD – would you rather your fans deify
you or anthropomorphosize you into someone like themselves?

Sam – I don't understand the question.

QRD – they can either put you on a pedestal
or say, "I identify with him, because he's just like me."

Sam – the second one.

QRD – is that which one they do?

Sam – yeah. occasionally there's
some things that feel like a pedestal & that's awkward. because
I'm just me, give me a break, I don't know how to react to that.

QRD – do you feel that the slowing down
of black tape for a blue girl with the growth of Projekt has hurt you as
an artist or forced you to make better records & push yourself more?

Sam – both. it has hurt me as an
artist because an artist should be making art & I don't make enough
art. however, when I do make a record, since there's a longer time
in between them, it seems like there's a lot more change to me. that's
to me though, I don't know about the audience, but to me it feels quite
different because it's three years later.

QRD – what's your favorite song that's
not on the new record?

Sam – by me? I dunno. my favorite
album is probably a chaos of desire, & it's hard to pick one because
they all just flow together to me. so it would probably be something
on there, but I don't know what.

QRD – do you feel that Projekt's future
is more towards the ambient crowd or the goth crowd?

Sam – I would say that it's sort of what
you by your choice call the "goth crowd." I think if you think about
black tape & Lycia though they do have ambient elements they are pretty
much in that crowd. I don't think that either of those would be snorfled
up by the ambient crowd, they're probably still going towards the goth
crowd. but I just think that's just more of where it's at for Projekt.

QRD – has it always been that way? that
that's which one you've preferred?

Sam – yeah. my music has an ambient element
to it too, so I can't just break it one way or the other. I can't
say black tape is just that, because it still has ambient in it.
but I think always the stronger support has come from the gothic crowd.

QRD – what's your favorite Swans song?

Sam – I have never heard a Swans song
that I know of. I've probably heard them at a club, but I didn't
know it was the Swans. answer: I don't know. wait, did I just make
myself look stupid?

QRD – what kind of monster would you most
like to be & what kind do you most identify with?

Sam – I am not very knowledgeable about
monsters. probably one of the big ones that can destroy cities.
that'd be the funnest monster to be.

QRD – & the kind you most identify
with?

Sam (snooty goth voice) – the Phantom
of the Opera (laughter).

QRD – what's the most punk thing you've
ever done?

Sam – I stole an extension cord from one
of the clubs on this tour.

QRD – what's the number one trick of being
a successful band?

Sam – doing what you want to do.

QRD – were the written unsung lyrics like
on the rope originally supposed to be sung?

Sam – no. those songs were instrumentals
& I had been writing stuff & it just seemed like a nice idea to
put stuff with instrumentals. so that's where it came from.
they were never meant to be sung & not finished or something like that.

QRD – what's the connection between the
written piece & the song?

Sam – I think often times the piece was
already written & I just clipped the title out of the written piece.

QRD – so the songs were untitled?

Sam – I think, I can't remember because
that was a long time ago & I have Ronald Reagan's disease.

QRD – in the eighties did you want black
tape to be a live band?

Sam – I never really thought about it,
so the answer would be no. Oscar lived in florida & I was in
school & who's gonna go to see a band do original music when no one
has heard of the band. it would be really hard.

QRD – do you think noise culture &
musical dada-ists have a future where they make a living?

Sam – I think you can make a living at
anything if you know how to sell it right. if you look at Philip
Glass, he was at one time considered really weird & he's making a living
at it now, but he's less weird than Glenn Branca. & Sonic Youth
took it & did enough to it that they can live off it.

QRD – do you think its moment's passed
or its moment's coming?

Sam – to me, & I'm not familiar with
the examples you gave, the things that would be called music concrete is
so annoyingly boring. all that stuff where you hear people tuning
radios & banging on drums & dropping things is so dull. I
hope they can't make a living at it so they'll stop doing it, but not the
people you mentioned because I don't know them.

QRD – so do you know what no-wave is?

Sam – I thought no-wave was like the Talking
Heads late seventies new york scene. no-wave as far as I know was
the stuff Eno & Cale were producing in the mid to late seventies.
that's what I thought it was.... it was kind of rock still &
kind of punk. like remember how Lords of the New Church were considered
alternative & you hear them now & it's like the Who or something,
it's just rock & roll. terms get old & lost.

QRD – what's your favorite slur of the
name black tape for a blue girl?

Sam – I haven't heard enough slurs to
vote on one. it's just people being goofy.

QRD – so how do you keep cats from pee-ing
on furniture?

Sam – give them to Michael Plaster. then
they won't pee on my furniture. I don't have that problem with our
cat. it's a very good cat

QRD – what's going on with lovesliescrushing,
are they gonna have another record?

Sam – I don't know. Scott calls
me about every two weeks & says, "I got my new record done!" &
I say, "great, send it to me," & I never see it, so I don't know.
one day.

QRD – I keep hoping, even though everybody
says the day has passed for the My Bloody Valentine derivative school of
guitar.

Sam – it's funny, I never listened to
My Bloody Valentine. so when Scott sent me that I was like, "wow."
& then everybody said it sounded like that & I was like, "who's
My Bloody Valentine?" I'd heard the name, but....

Sam – I've been listening to Fripp &
Eno like No Pussyfooting since 1978 or something like that. so there's
a history for that kind of stuff. Scott had never actually heard
that album. there's a lot that's in that same tradition even if it's
independent. a lot of people haven't heard that because it's "god-awful-noise,"
but that album came out in 1975 so it's a twenty year tradition.

QRD – so, you growing your hair out?

Sam – no, actually I got it cut. I got
about a foot cut off of it, but now it's growing again. the last
time I had my hair cut was in 1984.

QRD – do you think christianity is on
the rise or in decline?

Sam – I think lately it's been in decline.

QRD – do you think that's good or bad?

Sam – no. I don't know. maybe it's
because I don't live in california anymore you don't have as many nuts
in the parking lot screaming at you with bullhorns so it seems like there's
less christianity around, but maybe it's the same. there're probably
more christians in the midwest, but they're just not so in your face about
it.

QRD – do you think militant christians
are any better or worse than militant satanists?

Sam – at least the militant satanists
have a sense of humor. I don't know enough militant satanists.
militant vegetarians are kind of annoying also. anything's annoying
in your face.

QRD – your doing a tour for your book,
how many copies did you press & is it actually distributed enough to
actually warrant it?

Sam – yeah. 5,000 books were made &
we press the accompanying cd as we need it.

QRD – is it going to be limited to 5,000?

Sam – no, the cover will probably change
color or something like that & I'll press more. I think I only
have 1500 left. it's doing as well as lush garden through the distributor
now. probably because it has different packaging.

QRD – do you have any wisdom for anybody?

Sam – if you put soy sauce on scrambled
eggs it makes them taste a little bit more meaty but they're still eggs.

QRD – what's your favorite cartoon?

Sam – I'd like to say Ren & Stimpy,
but I don't watch it much.

QRD – who's your favorite ghostbuster?

Sam – I've never seen it, but I do like
Planet of the Apes quite a bit.

QRD – Planet of the Apes rips, but I don't
know about the cartoon of it.

Sam – the cartoon was pretty bad &
the tv series wasn't very good.

QRD – I like the one where they go to
the seventies.

Sam – that one was lame, it's just a highway
to the next one.

QRD – the next one's good, Julius takes
over the world.

Sam – the book is really good. the
book is much better than the movie because it has extra stuff in it.

QRD – does it have Ricardo Montalban?

Sam – it doesn't say Ricardo Montalban,
but you know he is the guy playing Armando. you know it's him. I
don't think there's a book for the third movie because it was so bad.
so if someone does have the book for the third movie, please send it to
me care of Projekt.

QRD – on Fantasy Island, remember how
he was like, "how will they survive off of the island...." do you think
he kills them all?

Sam – no. have you ever seen him
when he was a young man in the forties? he was a male lead, the sexy
male lead in films. he & Desi Arnaz went up for some movie roll
& he got it & Desi didn't so Desi went on to do I Love Lucy instead.
but he was the romantic lead. he's had three careers. he was
a romantic lead in the forties, then he was a nobody, then he had Fantasy
Island, & then Star Trek.

QRD – what did you think of the Simpsons'
rendition of Planet of the Apes?

Sam -- "Stop the Planet of the Apes,
I Wanna Get Off?" that was great. I was reading in some fanzine that there
were thirteen references to Planet of the Apes in various episodes.